Russia

If we believe the struggle is for “global democracy” and “human rights,” then that may put Putin on the other side. But how then can we be allies of President el-Sissi of Egypt and Erdogan of Turkey, and the kings, emirs, and sultans of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Oman? But if the new world struggle is about defending ourselves and our civilization, Russia would appear to be not only a natural ally, but a more critical and powerful one than that crowd in Kiev.

Believing Putin robbed Hillary Clinton of the presidency, Democrats are bent on revenge—on Putin and Trump. And the epidemic of Russophobia makes it almost impossible to pursue normal relations. Indeed, in reaction to the constant attacks on them as poodles of Putin, the White House seems to be toughening up toward Russia.

There is an anti-constitutional coup taking place in this country. And on Monday the coup plotters registered their first kill: LTG Mike Flynn, President Trump’s national security advisor. In this must-read article we offer conservatives a definitive analysis of how and why the deep state took out General Flynn.

The U.S.-South Korea alliance has outlived its usefulness. Instead of reassuring Seoul, the Trump administration should prepare to renegotiate the alliance, creating a looser but more equal cooperative military relationship. South Korea should take on responsibilities commensurate with its capabilities.

Gen. Mike Flynn committed an unforgivable sin in the eyes of Democrats and the Republican national security establishment; he wrote a book proving what they have been doing for twenty-five years hasn’t been working. Even more unforgivably, he then managed to place himself next to a President who agrees, and is prepared to take his advice and examine whether the United States can have a new and more productive relationship with Russia.

Obviously the world is a messy place. But what stresses American policymakers? It’s not the problem of defending the U.S. No other country has a conventional capability to reach America. Thus, America's national security team need not worry about the sort of potential threats facing virtually every other nation.

Trump's inauguration speech, in which he repeated and hammered home his message that he would put "America First," makes it plain enough that the new president is not anti-American, as does so much of what he has said during the past 20 months. But his suggestion of moral equivalence between the United States and Putin's Russia throws his own country under the bus.

There is no evidence that the Putin government intends to start an aggressive war against Europe, and no alliance member, including the Baltic States and Poland, has boosted military outlays as if it believed conflict was imminent. Rather, the Europeans have concentrated on demanding that America do more.

Democrats want Sessions to concede, in effect, that he has a powerful motive to conceal Russia’s espionage — such that he must recuse himself because we cannot trust him to lead a fair and impartial investigation. Implicitly, Sessions would be conceding — and thus cementing — the fiction that “Russia hacked the election.”

President Obama is the most unaccomplished man to ever hold the office and has been given an eight-year free pass and never held to account for his failures; while Donald J. Trump hasn't even been sworn in and is already a human pinata for the snowflake right and the radical left.

Montenegro is a quaint, but geopolitically irrelevant. Balkan state. If Montenegro's admission to NATO is approved by the full Senate, Americans will have yet another essentially useless defense dependent, this one a corrupt, long-time gangster state.

The more toxic Putin-haters can make the Russian president, the more difficult for President Trump to deal with him, even if that is in the vital national interest of the United States. The sort of investigation for which McCain has been clamoring, and the Beltway drums have now begun to beat, could make it almost impossible for President Trump to work with President Putin.

Waving away allegations about his ties to Russia by calling them "unverified" isn't adequate. Before taking office, Trump owes it to the public to clear the air. He can do this by laying out real consequences for Russian hacking and meddling, promising real aid to Ukraine, distancing himself from Manafort and shooting straighter on his taxes and his business entanglements.

The worst mistake President Trump could make would be to let the Russophobes grab the wheel and steer us into another Cold War that could be as costly as the first, and might not end as peacefully. Reagan’s outstretched hand to Gorbachev worked. Trump has nothing to lose by extending his to Vladimir Putin, and much perhaps to win.

The neo-con counter to Trump’s “Make America Great Again” seems to be shaping up to be “Make Russia Evil Again.” If President-elect Trump wants to drain the swamp in DC, and formulate a new national security policy focused on winning cyberwarfare battles and eradicating ISIS and militant Islam, he should start by draining Obama’s Pentagon.

Thanks in large measure to Angela Merkel, a Muslim army has successfully crossed the Mediterranean, European culture and nation-states are in full retreat, and Phase Six of the Muslim conquest of the West is well and successfully under way.

Let’s not pretend the “Russia hacked the election” farce is anything other than what it is: a scheme by the Democrat-media complex to rationalize a do-over — to persuade the Electoral College that it is not bound by the election results. The spectacle we’re watching has nothing to do with Russia.

Tillerson can emerge from his confirmation hearings with his reputation enhanced and with senators confident in Trump's choice. But they will not do so unless he is cogent and convincing in dealing with the question of Russia, and in allaying concerns that America's relations with that rogue state have suddenly taken a sharp and disquieting turn.

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government has accommodated the Islamic State, allowing passage of men and materiel into Syria and facilitated the sale of oil seized by the violent jihadists. Turkey increasingly thwarts U.S. policy in the Middle East.

Candidate Donald Trump got NATO right. When it includes states like Montenegro it no longer serves America’s defense. He should speak on behalf of the American people who are expected to pay for everyone else.